The present invention relates to a liquid ejection apparatus.
An inkjet printer (hereafter simply as a “printer”) is one known apparatus for ejecting liquid to a target. The printer has a recording head (liquid ejection head) and supplies ink (liquid) from an ink cartridge to the recording head. The ink is ejected from nozzles of the recording head to a recording medium, which functions as a target. To print photograph images generated by digital cameras, printers having a “marginless printing” function, that is, printers for printing on the entire surface of a recording medium, have been recently proposed. As one example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2001-158162 describes a printer having the marginless printing function.
In this type of printer, the solvent included in the ink tends to evaporate through the nozzles of the recording head. This may increase the viscosity of the ink or solidify the ink. Further, the nozzles of the recording head may be clogged by dust adhered to the nozzles or air bubbles entering the nozzles. To eliminate such problems, in addition to ejecting ink toward a printing recording medium, the printer performs a flushing operation for forcibly ejecting ink toward a recording medium.
To enable high speed printing, printers with a large recording head having nozzles aligned in a direction perpendicular to the feeding direction of a recording medium throughout the entire width of a print area (referred to as full-line head printers) have been proposed. When such a full-line head printer performs a flushing operation, the printer ejects ink to a feeding belt, which feeds a recording medium, without moving its recording head from a print position. The ink on the feeding belt is wiped off afterwards. However, the ink on the feeding belt may not be wiped off completely. In this case, the residual ink may stain a recording medium that is fed after the flushing operation.
To solve the above problem, for example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2001-105628 describes a method for feeding a flushing sheet, which is formed from an absorbent, to a position immediately below a recording head with a feeding belt and ejecting ink onto the flushing sheet. With this method, the ink is not directly ejected onto the feeding belt. Thus, neither the feeding belt nor a recording medium that is fed after the flushing operation is stained.
A printer using the above method dries the flushing sheet after the flushing operation and reuses the flushing sheet. The flushing sheet is disposed of when the amount of ink absorbed in the sheet exceeds a tolerable range. However, when the single flushing sheet is used repeatedly, the flushing sheet absorbing ink may not be dried in time for the next use of the flushing sheet. As a result, the flushing sheet may have low absorbency when the sheet is used again. Further, the ink may stain the user's hands and clothes when disposing of the used flushing sheet.